"The ECLIPSE trial reflects the growing complexity of coronary artery disease (CAD) seen in the modern-day cardiac catheterization laboratory, and will be the largest randomized clinical trial to date to assess the use of adjunctive coronary atherectomy for calcific coronary artery disease," said Dr. Ajay Kirtane, director of the Cardiac Catheterization Laboratories at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center, and co-principal investigator of the trial.

ECLIPSE will be a prospective, multi-center, randomized clinical trial of up to 2,000 subjects performed in up to 60 sites in the United States. Half the participants will receive orbital atherectomy prior to DES implantation, while the other half will receive conventional angioplasty, including specialty balloons, followed by DES implantation. The trial will be powered to demonstrate differences in the primary endpoints of post-procedural minimal cross-sectional area (assessed by intravascular imaging in a subset of up to 400 patients) as well as in the clinical outcome of target vessel failure at one year. The trial is expected to begin recruiting in spring 2017.